The US has intensified its diplomatic efforts with its friends and allies in particular its Quad partners Australia, India and Japan - to expose Chinas surveillance programme through high altitude floating balloons, days after a huge Chinese spy craft was shot down by an American fighter jet.
China has intensified its efforts of expanding its territory in the Himalayan region, and in support of the countries that are struggling against it like Nepal and Tibet, the United Kingdom has been taking steps to counter it.
In recent years, U.S. warships, and on occasion those from allied nations such as Britain and Canada, have sailed through the strait, drawing the ire of China, which claims Taiwan against the objections of its democratically elected government. In a statement, the U.S. military said the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer Chung-Hoon carried out the transit.
Australia has approved a request to extradite former U.S. Marine Corps pilot Daniel Duggan to the United States where he faces charges of money laundering and breaking U.S. arms control laws, the Attorney-General's Department said on Thursday. Duggan, who was arrested in Australia in October and remains in custody, is accused of breaking U.S. arms control laws by training Chinese military pilots to land on aircraft carriers, according to a 2017 indictment unsealed by a U.S. court in December.